State of the Market

[oliverson]

I'm near Kidderminster - Brum is an easy commute and have had roles in Cheltenham, Cheshire, Bristol in the past on a daily commute. In the past I'd go further afield and do the Mon-Fri thing but opportunities for this are fewer because of the number of roles inside IR35 which do not seem to pay sufficiently enough to compensate. 1 day a week with a night over I could probably take but the London inside roles wanting you onsite 3 days a week, forget it under the current regime.

As for permanent, it all depends on the role I guess Shouldn't write it off but I have a contractor's CV. I'd need to make it very clear that I'm done with contracting and be convincing. One line I was thinking of taking was to emphasise a successful contracting career but, for various reasons (especially my age) this lifestyle no longer works for me and I want to see out my career in a more secure working environment. Then again, mentioning age and the fact I only want to work for another 5 years is probably not such a good idea. Other than that, yes Pluralsight etc. Currently putting together a simple app with React, .Net 6 and AWS & trying to incorporate the equivalent features of Vue/Angular with which I'm familiar -Vuex, Ngrx Store etc.

The problem with this tech stack, aside from .NET, is that you're competing with a bunch of kids who've done nothing but JS front-end work. All prepared to work for probably half what you would. I'm a similar age and I ditched the front-end stuff a while back. Even if you start getting interviews, what you will confronted with over a Zoom (or similar) call is kids young enough to be your son doing the interviewing. Put yourself in their shoes. They're staring at you on the screen, old enough to be their dad. Cast your mind back. Would you give your dad a 'job'? Probably not, you'd be looking for one of you 'own kind', whether right or wrong. But the .NET stuff, they just don't have it. It has more than enough legs to see out your career, and mine, and you'd probably be working with people of a similar age. I am. You may find that kind of role involves some of the other tech. Mine does (React, Angular, Node.js, etc) but they aren't the main tech. But the AWS, or any other cloud, Azure would be a better fit for the .NET stuff, yes.

[Bluenose]

I'm near Kidderminster - Brum is an easy commute and have had roles in Cheltenham, Cheshire, Bristol in the past on a daily commute. In the past I'd go further afield and do the Mon-Fri thing but opportunities for this are fewer because of the number of roles inside IR35 which do not seem to pay sufficiently enough to compensate. 1 day a week with a night over I could probably take but the London inside roles wanting you onsite 3 days a week, forget it under the current regime.

Its a bleak time of year to be looking for work but things can quickly change. Worth keeping in mind that some roles will advertise hybrid working but that's been done by the HR department to tick a box and what you might find when you do the interview, is very different.

I did about 8 interviews last year, most of the people I spoke to had not been in an office all year except for a quarterly staff do. Only 2 of the interviews I did said that 3 days-per-week onsite was mandatory and you know what, they were the bottom two places in the 8 that I would have wanted to work at. Don't get me wrong, I would have accepted the offers and then looked for work elsewhere but I am finding that those workplaces that allow technology staff to work remote and come in when needed (i.e. probably never) are probably the best places to work for.

What you might want to do then is maybe apply anyway, the slave trader on the phone won't actually know (even if they swear that have known the client for 20 years and been best man at their funeral, married their daughter, the usual guff) and its only when you rock up to the interview with the person that you will be working for that you actually find out what working practises there are. I would not go off the Jobserve adverts.

[dx4100]

The contract I got offered over Christmas is back from the dead. Another call direct with the Client today and they have confirmed the contract should be with me within Days. Seeing will be believing but as its now coming direct from the client rather than the recruitment agent I feel a bit more confident its going to happen. Still interviewing for other things just in case.

I was questioning if my phone was broke the other day but last couple of days after tweeking my CV and hammering linkedin my phone has been going off the hook. Huge increase in inside gigs now compared to last time I was looking... To be honest, I think I prefer inside gigs now given all this MSC stuff going on with accountants. Its good to see the rates for inside roles have been adjusted so there is little reason not to take one these days.

[Bluenose]

I was questioning if my phone was broke the other day but last couple of days after tweeking my CV and hammering linkedin my phone has been going off the hook.

My burner phone goes off the hook all the time at this time of year because people have no real roles and have telephone quotas to fill.

If its still ringing by the end of February (it wont be) then I will raise an eyebrow.

If others are getting lines of interviews sorted out then let us know here.

[mogga71]

I'm near Kidderminster - Brum is an easy commute and have had roles in Cheltenham, Cheshire, Bristol in the past on a daily commute. In the past I'd go further afield and do the Mon-Fri thing but opportunities for this are fewer because of the number of roles inside IR35 which do not seem to pay sufficiently enough to compensate. 1 day a week with a night over I could probably take but the London inside roles wanting you onsite 3 days a week, forget it under the current regime.

As for permanent, it all depends on the role I guess Shouldn't write it off but I have a contractor's CV. I'd need to make it very clear that I'm done with contracting and be convincing. One line I was thinking of taking was to emphasise a successful contracting career but, for various reasons (especially my age) this lifestyle no longer works for me and I want to see out my career in a more secure working environment. Then again, mentioning age and the fact I only want to work for another 5 years is probably not such a good idea. Other than that, yes Pluralsight etc. Currently putting together a simple app with React, .Net 6 and AWS & trying to incorporate the equivalent features of Vue/Angular with which I'm familiar -Vuex, Ngrx Store etc.

TBH if you are in your late fifties I think you probably have a better chance with contracting than permie. I am at a big IB in the City and there are literally hundreds of over 50s contractors and hardly any over 50 permie devs. One thing I have noticed is that a lot of them work on back-end technology .... a lot being database and data pipeline specialists. Youngsters seem to be a bit scared of the relational DBMs monsters ... probably for good reason in this big data age.

[Skag]

My burner phone goes off the hook all the time at this time of year because people have no real roles and have telephone quotas to fill.

If its still ringing by the end of February (it wont be) then I will raise an eyebrow.

If others are getting lines of interviews sorted out then let us know here.

Pretty quiet at the moment. It should be picking up about...now, i.e. the last 5-10 days of Jan, and it hasn't. I usually start my contracts in mid-Feb.
I think the market is quite quiet in anticipation of how the global economy will move overall. I wouldn't expect companies to start investing money either. All in all, if it goes on like this, I think we're looking at a covid-level market repetition for a good 6-7 months.

[dx4100]

My burner phone goes off the hook all the time at this time of year because people have no real roles and have telephone quotas to fill.

If its still ringing by the end of February (it wont be) then I will raise an eyebrow.

If others are getting lines of interviews sorted out then let us know here.

True - nothing has come out of it

[gables]

TBH if you are in your late fifties I think you probably have a better chance with contracting than permie. I am at a big IB in the City and there are literally hundreds of over 50s contractors and hardly any over 50 permie devs. One thing I have noticed is that a lot of them work on back-end technology .... a lot being database and data pipeline specialists. Youngsters seem to be a bit scared of the relational DBMs monsters ... probably for good reason in this big data age.

Quite an interesting observation above. I'm 58 and since turning 50 have flitted between contracting (public sector) then permie (private sector) and now back to contracting at a bank who have since approached me regards going permie. As I said the above from mogga is quite interesting as I often think that I'll need to go permie soon and stay there until retirement, but maybe not :-)

[Fraidycat]

I think the market is quite quiet in anticipation of how the global economy will move overall. I wouldn't expect companies to start investing money either. All in all, if it goes on like this, I think we're looking at a covid-level market repetition for a good 6-7 months.

I was hoping because the UK stockmarket was holding up well, things wont get so bad in the UK.
Europe is seen as a good investment relative to US stocks at the moment, including UK stocks for some reason.

But who knows maybe there will be stock market crash in the UK this year as well. Then things will really get dire.

[TheDude]

It's gone very quiet at the moment.

When I stop getting approaches for BAML in Bromley I will know the market has flatlined.